Does Froch now have a better record than Calzaghe?

Hopkins best days were not behind him let's be honest and Kessler (who was not what he was in the Calzaghe fight) still beat Froch but yes you have to admit Froch's been gamer in opponents he's took on but Calzaghe was a much better boxer.

 

Former Olympian and IBF/IBO champion ****? na mate.

 

Level pegging to be honest....

If Carl can avenge his defeat to Kessler in emphatic fashion then i would argue that he has had the better career.

 

No, I'd still go with Calzaghe saying that as a Froch fan.

Abraham has pretty much been found wanting at 168, Bute is probably Carl's best win as for Pascal I've never rated him personally.

The best way to look at It is Joe beat the man at the time to unify the division and Carl didn't.

 

There is not much in it at this stage.
I think Froch has a better record of travelling and fighting opponents at their peak.
Calzaghe was undefeated and despite not fighting his more recognised opponents at their peak, that is still a great achievment.
I think a young prime Calzaghe would probably UD a prime Carl Froch but I wouldn't like to bet on it.

 

Froch has the better record, for me. Calzaghe might have had the talent to have a better record but the fights didn't happen for whatever reason and going on the fights he did have it's tough to make a case for Calzaghe's record being better. The RJJ fight means nothing at that point, he didn't unify until late in his career when there had been legitimate other belt holders around at the same time as him, Eubank was well past his best, he wasn't great against Hopkins - I thought he lost at the time, but have only seen it live the once and did not score it - Kessler has been found wanting at the top level and history sees that Lacy was not as good as people thought going into the fight. I am a big Calzaghe fan, went to some of his fights, but great performances against solid opposition don't mean as much when there were often better fights that they didn't take.

I thought Froch threw it away against Kessler, didn't put it on him when he needed to, so was not outclassed (I think he looks back and thinks he could have got a win there had he listened to McCracken) but he has a great record against a much higher average level of opposition - particularly when viewed in context of what was available at the time, he has genuinely tried to fight all of them - so I struggle to see how Calzaghe's record is still superior.

And I think a prime Bute is way ahead of a prime Lacy, so if those are the Froch and Calzaghe's best wins, then it's still Froch.

Anyway, apologies for the appalling syntax, but I think this fight puts Froch ahead. And I do think he will rematch Kessler and win that at some point, in the nearish future, which for me makes it stark.

 

If Froch were to beat Kessler in the rematch would this change your mind?

 

But you dont mention the fact Froch got a very suspect decision over Dirrell, got schooled by Ward and lost to a faded Kessler.

Calzaghe was unfortunate that the coward Ottke was holding belts hostage in Germany during his reign....its public knowledge he wanted no part of Calzaghe.

That being said I think his wins over Hopkins and Kessler are better than any of Froch's. Abraham and Bute could be compared to Lacy (although Lacy had way more hype going in). Both were previously exposed and wont go on to do anything else at 168. Taylor was damaged goods...more so than Eubank was. Pascal doesnt touch the Hopkins or Kessler wins.

It it getting closer though.

 

I wasn't trying to be dishonest about it, just got lost in my own rant lol.

Froch threw it away against Kessler, imho - he kept backing off, making it easy to give points to Kessler. So he wasn't dominated, or muscled out of the fight, or even beaten directly, he just didn't listen to his corner, took it too casual - it was like sparring at times - and dropped a decision by a couple of points that would have gone the other way had he woken up.

I had Froch winning the Dirrell fight by a point, I think people went overboard on the robbery because Dirrell has such a good mouth, but Dirrell ran all night and did not do enough to take quite enough rounds, imho. Horrible fight, I hated it, but Dirrell didn;t engage and as I say I though Froch won,, so no controversy for me.

Yes, Froch was schooled by Ward, but I think he fought entirely the wrong fight - and now they're hinting at problems during that period - and given how Ward is rated I don't think that picking up an L to him does enough to offset the benefit to Froch's record of the other fights, the ones above the class Calzaghe fought at.

And on the Dirrel point, in Calzaghe's Byron Mitchell fight Mitchell - who wasn't that amazing - wobbled Calzaghe then got on the wrong end of a dodgy stoppage, which to the Americans looked like a dodgy home town decision to help the protected Calzaghe. Calzaghe also had some really poor performances against some very ordinary opposition. Off the top of my head there were a few like the Kubary Salem (SP!!) fight that really weren't great yet formed by far the bulk of his defences.

The Kessler fight was very late on - Froch would have tried to make taht happen earlier, whereas Calzaghe wanted to wait until he had made a lot of money and defences before starting his retirement tour, imho.

Take your point entirely on Ottke, a stain on boxing - the Reid fight was about the worst I have seen. Reid was warned for hitting him at one point.

But as I said - I thought Calzaghe was lucky to get the nod against Hopkins, I thought Hopkins won it (by a whisker), so for me that doesn't stack up as a better win than Froch's.

And Bute is way better than Lacy (prime for prime). In my opinion.

 

You could also say 3 fighters out of froch's resume were past prime, taylor, Abraham, johnson.

 

Froch won't beat kessler.

 

You could - although I'm not sure that they were anywhere near as far past as RJJ! - but I would counter that those three fights are not as important to Froch's record as the past-prime fighters are to Calzaghe's. Take away Hopkins, RJJ (and maybe a handful of the mid-reign defences) from Calzaghe's record and this isn't even a conversation.

Particularly once Froch flattens Kessler in the rematch there! If Green can drop him...

 

At the moment i'd say Calzaghe has the better record. I'd say you'd have to give it a couple of more years to really compare the 2 though. If we're saying Bute is Froch's greatest win and he gets starched in his next 2 fights it aint gonna look so great, as Calzaghe himself found out after beating Jeff Lacey. I seem to remember Mcguigan and co saying Calzaghe's win over Lacey was the greatest performance by a british fighter and yet its hardly ever mentioned anymore

 

Yeah, it would probably put him over the top in my eyes, even if this version of Kessler is a bit more shopworn than the one that fought Calzaghe.

As I said its very close at the moment for me, so a win against current Kessler would be another quality scalp, and Froch would probably have the better record.